


ADVENTURE!

by rezi



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Fluff, Fun, Gen, Gumption, Lasses, Silly
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-03-26
Updated: 2014-03-26
Packaged: 2018-01-17 02:22:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,357
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1370374
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rezi/pseuds/rezi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Two gumptious young lasses -- one a nautical princess, one an explorer's granddaughter -- follow in the explorer's footsteps by going on an adventure of their own! Join them as they delve into the deepest depths of Jade Harley's island residence! Featuring a fearless fishy friend, a basement full of treasure, a mythical healing fruit and much, much more!</p><p>Will the girls be successful on their daring mission? Will they succeed in finding the legendary Raspberry of Rejuvenation? Will there be much laughter and gaiety all the while? Find the answers to these questions, and many more, within!</p>
            </blockquote>





	ADVENTURE!

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Genten](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Genten/gifts).



> Prompt by Genten: "Jade has a visitor and decides to show her around the island! I think Bec would be cute in there too. Jade might be really excited (maybe a bit too much) and Feferi is a little overwhelmed. I've always wanted to see how their canon personalities would play out in a normal(er) setting like Jade's island. I'd prefer a non-angst piece."

 

There's a disturbance in the water. A panicked flurry of bubbles swims skywards, bursting at the surface. Then a hand, a lock of hair, a sleek curved horn. A creature rises from the bay.

You're not alarmed, of course. With a grandfather like Jacob Harley, making you a home amidst marvels and monstrosities, this humanoid being from beneath the ocean is fairly standard fare.

But she -- you're assuming she, with her regal high cheekbones and cascades of waterlogged hair  -- she is certainly alarmed. Worried. Distressed, even.

You see another creature in her hands, one more familiar: a shimmering rainbow fish, yet with the colour fast fading from its scales.

"Please help him," she pleads, voice lyrical yet mournful. Her song is almost a dirge.

And you can see why he needs help. There's a sickly red welt in his side, mingling runny red blood with his little puddle of water. His gills convulse. Poor thing!

But you know you can help. 

Your grandpa was always telling you stories. One of his finest escapades led to him discovering what he referred to as "the most priceless treasure I ever laid my peepers on". Just like all the others he'd tell you about, then. You've heard the story a thousand times: his daring trek through rainforests and rivers; his run-in with a hostile tribe that nearly ended him up as dinner; his admiration for the noble savage with the blue-painted skin who rescued him at last and showed him to his prize: the Raspberry of Rejuvenation. Ancient myths tell of how, even for those for whom death's door is already ajar, just a drop of its juice will make them well once more.

You know this one's true. A mythical pomegranate, passionfruit, papaya? Something like that could be fake. But a mythical raspberry? You couldn't make this up.

The catch: you haven't seen it since Grandpa died. And one thing it can't do is raise the dead.

In an instant, it's clear what you have to do. You're going to get into that house, battle your way through trophies built up over years of expeditions, track down that Raspberry of Rejuvenation and nurse this poor little fishy back to health!

"What's your name?" you ask the girl.

"I'm Feferi Peixes, seadweller empress-to-be!" she replies. There's a note of pride now in her singsong voice -- much better!

"Alright, Feferi..." You pause for dramatic effect. Your grandpa would be so proud of you right now: "We're going on an adventure!"

Your next pause, however, isn't for the sake of drama. It's because you've only just remembered something that should have been obvious:

"Do you have a fishbowl?"

***

BAM! Bursting through the door, you're in the house, hefty rifle at the ready. Not like you're going to need to shoot anyone or anything, but looking like a badass from those silly movies John shows you is really pretty fun. You're on an adventure, god dammit!

Plus, Grandpa's right there in front of you. Can't let him down.

Feferi is at your side, taking in the bizarre clutter of the foyer and looking a bit overwhelmed. Her voice diminishing, "Wow, uhh..." is all she can manage for a while. "Is it normal for humans to keep their dead on fishsplay like that?" She's hardly disgusted. More intrigued, like a schoolkid peering down at a crushed bug.

As for you, you stopped believing in normal when Grandpa brought home a huge monster and promptly dumped it at the bottom of the stairs.

But that's enough about Grandpa for now. Can't waste time on the dead -- you're saving a life!

"This way!" You hurry forward to the doorway; she glides along behind you, carefully cradling her fishbowl and its distressed occupant.

Then it's through a corridor, down a staircase and finally to a trapdoor. It's old and dusty, not having been touched since Grandpa died.

Beyond this trapdoor is treasure beyond comprehension: culturally and historically as well as monetarily. Decades of priceless detritus from expeditions and escapades have built up here. It could be a museum if it wasn't such a mess.

This is where myths come to rest.

You foresaw this, just a sliver of it. Your clouds showed you heaving up the trapdoor by its rusty iron ring: flashlight in one hand, rifle in the other. You brought your flashlight along in anticipation; now you play out the vision.

That's all Skaia's clouds showed you. Here on out, you're on your own.

A creaky wooden staircase lies between you and _everything_. The flashlight's dim beam sheds light on the jumble stored beyond. You make out a few details: some fibres of fur, a glimmer of gold.

Was that a growl you heard?

Your grip tightens on your gun; you're beginning to fear you may need it. Who knows what Grandpa stashed away back in the day?

And speaking of your grandpa's esoteric stashes, there's one problem that you have to face right now.

You have no idea where this thing is.

Onwards you creep, tiptoeing down every dark stair, delving into the depths inch by inch. Every step reveals another treasure: a female figure engraved with lapis lazuli, a glittering ruby hatstand, a priceless Aztec sculpture currently being used as a hatstand.

You feel the need to point out the obvious: "My grandpa was a weird guy."

"Hee hee!" Overenthusiastic giggles echo throughout the basement. "I understand! My grandma keeps a giant gold statue of herself in her palace and orders it polished every shingle day. They usually haven't even finfished by the time she orders it again!"

"Wow..." It's a moot point, then.

"But then, she is the Empress. She's practically obliged to be wei-- OH MY COD." Feferi has come face-to-sword with a giant stuffed swordfish. Her eyes are nearly bulging out behind her goggles with... fear? No, excitement! "SO. GLUBBING. COOL!"

"Reelly?" You even mentally spelt that with two Es, like a fishing rod. Cod dam it, these fish puns are conchtagious!

"Yeah! We do this to some of our old fronds back home!" She's stroking the swordfish's scaly skin, talking to around where you guess its ear would be: "You remind me of them. Shall I take you down there to say shello?"

"Feferi..." You gotta be honest here. "I have to say, that is kinda very weird."

"I'm going to be Empress. I'm practically obliged to be weird!" Now she seems to be introducing the two fishes to each other, singing in a bizarre, bubbly voice. The fish in the bowl is only barely responding.

Sigh... "This is all very fun, Feferi, but we have to save your fish!"

"Oh glub, yes, of course! I got myself fishstracted, sorry." She pats the swordfish on the head to say goodbye, then peers into the fishbowl under her arm: "You're not going to the cemeteries yet, Piscator!"

"He has a name?"

"Of course he has, fishface! He has a name just like you or I do. Are you alright in there, Piscator?"

His fins quiver a little in response. You'll have to hurry.

You press your face to the glass and whisper through to him: "Hang on in there, Piscator!"

Ha, you're talking to a fish. For some reason, you find that harder to believe than anything else. But when Piscator manages to twitch his tail in a friendly wave, you couldn't be happier. You're going to save this little fishy, no matter what it ta--

That growl you heard earlier, there it is again!

"We'd better get moving," you say, frantic to get this done with. 

You sweep the flashlight back and forth through the dust floating all around, pausing from time to time to investigate the bizarre discoveries you make. Sometimes you stumble on junk like a miniature cathedral made of toothpicks. Other times, it's priceless treasure like a stack of ancient gold coins -- actually, no, those ones were chocolate coins.

"Jeez, Grandpa, you couldn't make this easy!" you groan, budging your way past another pile of... gold-plated dog food? You won't be feeding that to Bec any time soon. If it was uranium-plated, on the other hand--

The growling's back again! And -- oh nooooo -- from what you can make out, something very scary is coming your way! Big and hairy and...

Squeaky?

A stuffed tiger, face frozen open in a taxidermised snarl, rolls past you on barely-oiled wheels. Round and round it goes, squeaking around in circles. Nearby, a Mechanical Turk-like device continuously lifts and replaces the needle on a record player, treating you repeatedly to Track 7 of _Sounds of the Jungle_ : "Tiger's Growl".

You and Feferi laugh so hard you nearly fall over, having to clutch each other to stay upright. Even Piscator blows a few bubbles, but then nearly doubles over in pain...

You need to find this treasure. And _quickly_.

"Look!" Feferi's points; you follow her glance to see two doors, side by side! The entrances are spotlit, alluring among the blackness. You feel drawn towards them. Behind one of those doors, you are sure, lies the exact treasure you seek.

You head for the door on the right, hoping that it will actually be the right door. You push down on the smooth handle, still untarnished after all these years, and peer inside to find...

... two nude blue mannequins in suggestive poses.

Grandpa, _why_?

"It's this door, silly!" calls Feferi from inside the other entrance.

Making haste out of the weird mannequin closet, you enter into the other room. A warm, golden glow greets you, exuding from an oasis in the centre of the room. On a tiny island grows a small raspberry bush, with a single berry enshrined among its leaves.

Now, you're no expert, but that looks like a Raspberry of Rejuvenation to you. 

Even being in the room seems to encourage Piscator. He swims up with all the strength he's got left, pressing his face up against the glass to get a clear view.

"At last!" Feferi gasps. "Now we can get some kelp for this poor buoy!"

... huh? "Why do we need kelp?"

"Help, silly!" She grins, displaying a full set of shark teeth.

"Ah, I get it!" You're getting the hang of these!

"Nice catch," she giggles.

Wading through the shallow waters, she squeezes the raspberry gently, allowing its juice to trickle into Piscator's bowl. From the moment the first drop splashes on his scales, he's restored: the rainbow fish swims a joyous loop-the-loop around his bowl, colour flooding back into his scales.

You and Feferi give each other big smiles.

"Wanna explore the rest of the house to celebrate?" you say.

"SHORE!"

As you make your way out of the basement, Feferi takes the opportunity to introduce the newly-revived Piscator to the swordfish. (They get along swimmingly, apparently!) Meanwhile, you discover something under the stairs. Something that would have been vitally important on your journey, if only you'd discovered it soon enough!

A light switch. 

Oh, well. Better late than never...?

***

You took her up through the tower, showing her around as you went. She was fascinated by everything she found, from the sarcophagi (you played hide-and-seek in them for a few minutes, though it wasn't very hard when she couldn't stop herself giggling) to your gardens (you gave her a few flower seeds to grow her own -- you're not sure how well that would work underwater, but it's the thought that counts) to even the weird blue lady photos (she tried swishing her hair aside to look like the ladies in the pictures -- then _you_ couldn't stop laughing). Finally you reached your room:

"They remind me of my friends!" Feferi exclaims, hugging a plush Squiddle in delight.

"You have friends down there who look like this?" 

"Of course! They're a little bigger... and some people find them scary... but they are very frondly once you get to know them!" She drops a Squiddle into Piscator's bowl, who swims around it and plays with it gleefully. "Maybe I can take you to meet them one day!"

"We'll sea," you laugh. 

You see the sun setting on the ocean, rays flooding your room with waves of light. Feferi looks a little downcast: "But not today, I'm expected back by dark..."

"We can always do this again, can't we?" Today was the best day you've had in a while. It's nice to have other people your age to play with, even if they are sea princesses.

"Yes, I'd love to!" She throws her arms around you and squishes you tight, then picks up Piscator's fishbowl. All attempts she makes to get the Squiddle out of the bowl are thwarted; looks like Piscator's made a friend! "Do you mind if he keeps the Squiddle?"

"That's fine!" Piscator twirls around in his bowl, making a flurry of bubbles. "It's a little damp now, anyway..."

After Feferi leaves, you run to your window: sure enough, there she is, running across the grass and leaping into the water. 

You flop down onto your bed, filled with the happy sort of exhaustion that comes after fun like this. You can't wait for tomorrow! Sleep will make the waiting quicker, but first you'd like to change into something more comfortable...

This wasn't a memory, this was something new. Your world and hers are merging, somehow. Your bubbles must be colliding... and you hope she stays in yours. You haven't had this good a time in the afterlife for... well, who knows how time works here?

You're remembering now. Here it comes...

Your clothes seem to ripple and then darken, changing suddenly yet fluidly into your God Tier dress. You remember a mirror in your pocket and it's there; a glance into it shows your milky white eyes. And further up on your head: an itch, then you see and feel your fluffy ears unfold. You wiggle them just to test. Yep, all here!

You tuck yourself in to your warm and cosy bed, your soft god pyjamas making you nice and comfy.

You loved the adventure you had today, you think as you fall asleep. You may be dead, but today you felt alive.

**Author's Note:**

> So I may have deviated from the prompt a fair bit, but I hope you like it anyway!
> 
> (Your other prompt was _brilliant_ , and I would have loved to do something for it, but what I had in mind would have been impossible to get done given my... undesirable circumstances lately. Perhaps I'll manage something for the treats...?)
> 
> EDIT, now I've been revealed as writer: so hey, anyone who happens to be a regular reader of my fics and is reading this now! Sorry I haven't updated anything in over a month; my life as of late could be accurately described as a WHIRLING HELLFIRE TORNADO. But the glorious two-week Easter holiday is upon me now, and I should have time to get back to updating!


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